Detox Day 8 - Feeling Great!

Good afternoon everyone :) I'm on my 8th day of my cleanse and I feel really good. I woke up and dragged my butt out of bed for 30 minutes of cardio at the gym. I have been feeling really lazy lately. I used to go to the gym 6 days a week and I'm definitely trying to get back into that habit. I also decided I need to do yoga after my training sessions to get some deeper stretching to try and counter any aggravation to the nerves I may experience during my training.

I'm eating some great food today. Let's take a lookie look.

I found these Almond Date Rolls in Whole Foods last night. I contemplated it for a minute and decided to splurge on them (they were $5). They are basically a date paste formed into the shape of a whole date and rolled in chopped almonds.

I couldn't wait to try them so I had one with a honeycrisp apple for breakfast.  Then I had a brilliant idea...

...to put the paste on the apple. So. Good. Best. Idea. Ever.

For lunch I had some veggie soup. Not homemade :( but still delicious!

For dinner I'm bringing this assortment of goodies. The rest of my sesame tofu from yesterday (I got it from the prepared section at WF's...someone asked how I made it, I forgot to answer!), my last pickle, some baby carrots and some steamed broccoli topped with a little garlic powder and nooch. This is gonna be a great dinner.

I'll probably finish out the day with some almonds or a few frozen grapes. I tried one before and it was interesting! I have to get used to the texture but it was very good and will certainly slow down the snacking process! ;)

Have a great day everyone!

Detox Day 7 - One week down!

Good evening everyone! Today was a busy day so I only was able to photograph a few of my meals but I figured it was better than none! I went to my new Dr. today to get checked out and thankfully she is a total sweetheart! I got really lucky that I just randomly found her because she is great. She agreed with everyone that the problem is probably pinched nerves...she thinks there are multiple give the areas of discomfort. I'm just glad that we figured out the problem...and possibly pinpointed what is aggravating it...and it isn't my training. Although the training doesn't help it I'm sure. Oh well. I guess I just need to lay low with the punching for a bit but I'm back at the gym training away and picking up some cardio. I'm hoping to start doing more yoga at home to stretch everything out.

So now that this chapter is closed for now, lets check out some food!

For breakfast I made a smoothie of frozen banana, 2 dates, almond milk, a little almond butter and some cinnamon. Very delicious!

Midmorning I had an apple for snack and it was perfect because I was craving something sweet big time!

I didn't get a photo of lunch but I had a big ol' bowl of veggie soup and it was really really good.

For dinner I had some sesame tofu with roasted brussels sprouts and a few grapes. I've been craving grapes like crazy and I finally picked some up. I love how I start to crave fruits and veggies when I eat clean like this :)

I've heard that frozen grapes make a yummy snack so I popped a few in the freezer to see how that works out. I'll let you know when I try them.

Hope you all have a good night! I'll be back tomorrow :)

Detox Day 6 - A Great Food Day!

Hey everyone! Sorry I didn't post yesterday, I had to work and I came home feeling like crap with a monster headache so I just checked around a few blogs and then just relaxed and watched the (FREE!!!) UFC fights. They are normally PPV but they played em for free on Spike so it was a great night for me after my headache eventually went away :)

Today I woke up at 5:30 am because of the time change so I just bummed around for a bit.  After breakfast I did some low impact cardio for an hour at the gym because I felt gross after not working out for a week. I have a training session tomorrow and I'll probably ask him if we can spend the last five minutes stretching my back and neck because hopefully that will help any discomfort that may come up.

Now lets check out the awesome food I ate today! Today's meals were so yummy.

Breakfast was an apple with almond butter, raisins, cinnamon and I added some coconut today. So delicious.

After the gym I had a banana as my midmorning snack.

For lunch I had a yummy plate of roasted chickpeas, roasted brussels sprouts, a carrot and a pickle.  One pickle left in my container :)

For an afternoon snack I had a HUGE mug of green tea and a few of my thai chili and lime cashews. Sorry no pic!

For dinner I made this yummy plate of spaghetti squash with my new favorite sauce made of grape tomatoes, garlic, a little olive oil and fresh basil. I added in some roasted veggies and sprinkled the top with some nooch. This is definitely a great meal! You can totally tell the difference when I use incandescent light as opposed to natural light in my photos. It was dark by 5:15! All of my dinners are going to be in ugly light so sorry about that!

Did my nails today! I LOVE this color. I'm really into the jewel toned vibrant colors in the fall. This one dried a little more blue than I thought it would but I'm thinking maybe if I put a top coat on maybe that'll help?

Hope you all had a wonderful weekend! Finally have my appointment with the doctor tomorrow so hopefully that'll get the process of figuring out my neck situation going and I'll get this all sorted out soon.

Almost one week into my cleanse. It's getting difficult to do breakfast without grains but just one week left! Does anyone have any grain free breakfast suggestions (other than smoothies and fresh fruit)?

Detox Day 4 is Veggietastic!

Hey everyone! Happy Friday! I still have to work tomorrow so it isn't quite my weekend yet but it still feels good to know it is right around the corner :)  First, when I got home from work today I was greeted by a package that contained the cookbook and apron that I won from this giveaway hosted by Molly!  Thank you so much Molly, I'm so excited and I know I'll get so much use out of both!

The cleanse is still going well, today is definitely a veggietastic day! I have a bit of a headache that I'm going to try and sleep off before dinner so I decided to post now because I don't know what I'll have for dinner and when that will be. I'm probably going to either have veggie soup or a piece of fruit depending on how I feel.

Sorry about the bad quality of this photo, I took it on my phone. I was going to have a fruit salad for breakfast. I went to grab one from a place by my house that always has nice fruit salads but they decided today they weren't going to put it out :( wah! Instead I just went to work and got some veggies cooked in olive oil and garlic (there was LOTS of garlic, so good!) and a banana. It was totally satisfying so I didn't even miss the fruit salad.

For lunch I had chopped salad with some balsamic vinaigrette.

When I got home from work I ate a handful of almonds as a snack. After I rest for a bit and hopefully get rid of this headache and get my appetite back I'll have dinner. I'm leaning toward the soup to finish the trifecta of vegcentric meals.

Have a great Friday night! I am shooting a Bar Mitzvah tomorrow and will post if I get a chance. If not I'll see you all on Sunday!!

Detox Day 3 and an Epic FAIL

So Shen graciously reminded me that I was supposed to try and make a baby food green smoothie and I figured there is no time like the present to try it!

First, this is a terrible pic so I'm sorry about that! Second, I was in a rush so I simply threw a frozen banana and a packet of baby food (spinach, peas and pears) into a blender and pureed it up. Um. EW. I think I'm just not a green smoothie girl because it was NASTY! I don't think I was expecting it to actually taste like veggies. It also yielded about 1/3 of a mug of smoothie so if I try it again I'll try all fruit baby food and I'll probably add another banana. 

I didn't drink the smoothie and knew I needed something for breakfast so I cut up an apple and put some almond butter in a container and was out the door.

Sorry I don't have pics for the rest of my meals but for lunch I ran to the deli and grabbed a small container of stewed zucchini and some beans. No rice, wah! :(

No dinner yet. It'll probably be roasted veggies and hummus. Maybe a pickle ;)

Have a great night and yay for Friday tomorrow!

Detox Day 2

Hey everyone! Today's post is going to be quick because I need to head out to work soon. Just to let you know I won't be posting every day of my detox because sometime you just need a break, but I'll be posting as much as I can.

Check out what I'll be eating today!

Breakfast was an apple topped off with some almond butter, raisins and cinnamon. Great way to start the day!

For a midmorning snack I'm planning on eating a banana and having a small coffee that is half decaf half regular. I'm trying people!!

I enjoyed lunch so much yesterday and have so much spaghetti squash that I decided to make the same meal again, except this time I added some broccoli. This will definitely be a hearty clean midday meal.

Dinner is going to be a big, beautiful chopped salad.

So far so good with this cleanse. I really love eating this way, it is just a matter of making it a habit again. Now that the winter is coming and wedding season is slowing down I'll have more time to cook and won't have to rely on convenience foods so I feel good that these habits will stick. 

Hope you all have a great day!!

Detox Day 1!

Hi everyone! As I mentioned before I'm starting my detox today. I've been feeling pretty crappy lately and have been lazy about meals and snacks and have been eating entirely too much processed food so I decided to do the same 4 week detox that I did when I cut gluten from my diet. It is pretty strict for the first two weeks where I cut all grains and added sugars (even maple syrup and things like that) and basically eat tons of fruit and veggies, some nuts and seeds and beans and limited tofu. The second two weeks I add back grains in moderation and then after the month I add in very limited natural added sugars.

So lets check out the menu for Detox Day 1!

For breakfast I kept it simple and cut up a bosc pear and paired it with a banana.

For a midmorning snack I lightly roasted 1/3 cup of pumpkin seeds that I lightly seasoned with pumpkin pie spice.

For lunch I cooked up a really beautiful, fresh, clean meal. I roasted up a batch of brussels sprouts and served them up with an amazing spaghetti squash dish. I made a fresh grape tomato sauce and it came out so good! I heated some garlic in about a tsp of olive oil and then added some halved grape tomatoes. After they softened I mashed them with a fork. Then I added some spacghetti squash and heated it all the way through and finished it of with some fresh basil. It tasted amazing!

I packed this bento box full of awesomeness to bring to work for dinner tonight. It is going to be veggie overload! I have one huge carrot all cut up, a few grape tomatoes, some hummus, a sliced pickle and some of the roasted veggies (which taste SO GOOD with hummus). This is going to be a really great, filling dinner.

And, I totally forgot to share this with you yesterday!!

This is my spooky Halloween picture but I figured it would work for Day of the Dead too ;)

Enjoy your day everyone!